Example of Why You Need a Realtor

If I've said it once, you've heard it a million times somewhere else. Don't even try to sell your home as For Sale By Owner - use a Realtor.

I don't say this because I'm a Realtor. I say this because it is soooooo much easier for you, and you are soooooo much more protected in the end.

True Story:

I know someone who has a condo for sale in Fort Myers, Florida right now, and they are trying to sell it For Sale By Owner (FSBO). They need to sell as soon as possible due to many different circumstances. But if you know anything about Florida real estate, you know that last year if a property was worth $350,000, this year it's worth about $310,000 (for example). And buyers are taking advantage of that.

The FSBO in Florida finally found a buyer after almost a year. The buyer came in and made an extremely low offer. The sellers tried to counter offer and bring the offer back to a fair level, but the buyer was willing to budge only very little. They ended up getting into contract for probably $20,000 - $30,000 less than fair market value for the property. They buyer was happy, the sellers were not, but they had no other choice.

So, they had an attorney draw up the paperwork. Both sides signed off on everything and they were in contract. The buyer then needed to get the earnest money deposit (a good faith deposit) to the sellers.

Long story short, after the buyer agreed to the contract, but before he sent the earnest money, he read an article in the newspaper about how bad the Florida real estate market is and how property values are down from last year. He already knew this, which is why he offered so low in the first place, but now he was having second thoughts.

So, instead of honoring the contract, he said, before I send the earnest money deposit, I want $10,000 more taken off the price of the home, or the deal is finished.

WHAT? He's already signed the contract and agreed to everything. If he walks away from the deal, the sellers will win, but how much money and how much time will this cost.

Well, after talking it over with the attorney, it's not worth it at first glance. And now the seller has to make the decision to sell the condo for even less than originally stated, or void the contract and try to find another buyer (which may take another year! Who knows!).

And all of this could have been helped if there was a Realtor involved. The attorney's paperwork didn't leave time restraints to the signatures being applied. Because there was no Realtor involved, important documents were left out, giving the buyer a loophole to get out of this contract. If a Realtor was involved and a buyer did this, not only would the seller have the option to sue, but you can rest assured, the Realtor's brokerage would sue the buyer as well. If all of that was the case, the buyer would not have tried to renoegotiate the contract, because it never would have gotten this far.

I understand, sometimes there isn't the option to use a Realtor because you think you can't afford it. But statistics don't lie... when using a Realtor, properties sell for well over a 5% larger sales price than when sold FSBO.

So when you think you can't afford to use a Realtor, you should be thinking "Can you afford NOT to use a Realtor?"

Dan Hamilton
dchamilton@kw.com
www.HamiltonHomesGroup.com